The State of Victoria: Preschools and the Reform Agenda

Abstract

Victorian preschools (kindergartens) have always been administered by a human services department. In August 1997 the Victorian Government announced that primary schools would be allowed to establish and run preschool services as joint ventures with the Department of Human Services. This would not seem to be such a revolutionary development in societies where preschools have long been under the umbrella of education bureaucracies, but in Victoria this decision was the result of an agonising process which reflects the political divisions in the early childhood field and the public sector reform agenda of the Liberal Government. The policy is an administratively ingenious compromise which meets the stated objectives of most stakeholders, particularly Kindergarten Parents Victoria, the peak body representing volunteer parent committees of management, which has resisted incorporation into the Education Department. Many stakeholders who support a complete merger with schools (i.e. most kindergarten teachers, many struggling parent committees of management, the Early Years Foundation, the Primary Principals’ Association, and key politicians from both parties) wish it had gone further. The government is well-satisfied with this arrangement, since it allows it to provide an integrated early childhood educational service in schools, using the much cheaper Human Services salary and cost structures to fund it. This paper outlines the new policy and the impact of public sector reform on key stakeholders’ attitudes to it.